


O, Death

by dustofwarfare



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Consensual, F/M, FFXV Kink Meme, I can't write anything short, Pre-Canon, ardyn is having way too much fun, but probably not the best idea, luna enjoys herself, lunardyn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-12
Updated: 2018-07-12
Packaged: 2019-06-09 11:48:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15266859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustofwarfare/pseuds/dustofwarfare
Summary: Ardyn slides his fingers into her mouth, then moves them in and out in a gesture so overtly sexual that her knees weaken. “As with any good devil worth his horns, I have many temptations to entice you into sin.”“Very well, devil,” she says lightly, murmuring the words around his fingers. “Entice me.”___Luna's life may be for the gods, but her body is hers to do with as she pleases. And tonight, it pleases her to let the devil have it.





	O, Death

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the prompt on the kinkmeme of: 
> 
> Idk I just wanted to see Luna sitting on Ardyn’s lap while he fucks her from behind. Don’t care about context but my dnw is noncon. I’m fine with dubcon though. 
> 
> Bonus: both are fully clothed but Luna’s clothes are in disarray (frumpled up, pooled around her waist, pulled down over her breasts, etc)
> 
> ....yeah I wrote 11K, okay, I don't know what's wrong with me, I have no self control?? But I did write the prompt! Promise! :D? 
> 
> Title from the traditional song by the same name (same with the quote at the beginning.)  
> Thanks to @marmolita for reading over (this is a cleaned up version of what was posted on the meme).
> 
> This is all consensual. Luna wants it, even if she probably shouldn't. Set pre-canon.

_**O, Death how you’re treating me** _

_**How you close my eyes so I can’t see** _

  
  


Luna returns from Cleigne with travel-dust clinging to every bit of her, as difficult to banish as the Scourge itself. Her hands tingle with the remnants of her holy power, but the only thing that will help is a long soak, a hot meal and a good night’s sleep.

She is tired. Her last journey, accompanied by the usual retinue of Imperial-mandated MTs and troopers, brought her into a territory where Lucian sympathies were all but shouted from the rooftops; she’d seen plenty of royalists spit on the ground when her entourage moved like silent ghosts behind her through the streets, though of course they afforded to  _ her  _ only cheers and flowers, gratitude and tears of joy.

It is a strange thing, to be so adored in the company of those who are so hated. Not that she blames them. Were she to have her way, there would be a Lucian royal flag flown from atop Fenestala Manor itself.

Luna heads immediately toward her rooms, caught as always in the trap of being glad to be home and yet aware that home is also her prison. Fenestala is beautiful and luxurious, but the fact remains that she is not permitted to leave without prior authorization and heavy guard.

A gilded cage is still a cage.

It could be worse. It might yet be. Her dreams are terrible things, as bad as they were in the years following her mother’s death; full of ruin and smoke and something watching her from the shadows. She dreams of her brother, lying twisted and broken with an unknown sword in his chest. She dreams of Noctis, trapped and dying beneath the rubble of his father’s throne.

In her waking hours, Luna finds herself staring often at the sun, as if memorizing the way its warmth feels on her eyelids.

The gods are stirring, but not yet awake. She can feel the impending storm gathering, a slight pressure behind her temples like a headache. She can sense it in the Scourge, which resists just a little more each time she seeks to cast it forth, and it seems to be mocking her as it goes.

_ Do as you will, Healer of Light _ , it hisses to her.  _ The time will come when you will no longer be enough. _

She knows that. Of course she does. She’s always known what it means for her, when the Chosen King rises.

Until then she will do what she can, will use the gifts the slumbering gods have bestowed upon her until she can do no more.

Luna is thinking only of a bath and perhaps some tea and biscuits when she finds Maria in the hallway, arms laden with freshly laundered sheets.

“My lady! You’ve returned!” Maria’s smile is wreathed and familiar, kind and welcoming.

Luna returns it warmly. “I have,” she says, and takes in the sight of Maria’s burden with a bit of a frown. “Is anything amiss?”

“Your brother has come to visit,” Maria’s smile dims a bit. “And he has brought a guest with him.”

Luna blinks. “A -a guest?” She has no notion of who that could be – her brother’s easy friendliness was burned away by the Empire years ago, on that day that marked the end of their childhood like the last page of a book.

Ravus himself prefers to spend most of his time in Gralea with the army. It is better that way; Luna loves him, but her disappointment and sorrow in what he has become is not a thing she can easily hide.

Nor does she wish to. He made a choice, and she vehemently despises his allegiances with every bone in her body. If he thinks she will play nice for the sake of peace between them, he does not understand that sometimes to heal a wound, you must first  make it bleed.

“The Imperial Chancellor,” says Maria. She moves a bit closer, voice pitched low. “He’s an…odd man.” She glances around, as if the man himself might appear out of a closed doorway to join their conversation. “Very odd.”

“Why on earth should the Chancellor wish to visit Tenebrae?” Tenebrae is a tribute state that provides little political value to Niflheim, other than boasting the Oracle as prisoner and the prince as a conscripted army officer.

_ Our jailhouse runs smoothly and the prisoners are quite docile _ , she thinks, unkindly.  _ There is no reason for the warden to concern himself with a visit. _

“I have no notion,” Maria says, lifting her arms to show the linens. “But whatever the reason, he shan’t have cause to complain about the hospitality of our noble house.”

Luna reaches out to gently draw her hand down Maria’s arm. Maria has an old injury on her left shoulder, from back in her days performing acrobatics on chocobo-back in a traveling carnival, and Luna knows it sometimes causes Maria distress.

Luna’s magic is at its limit but it’s enough to ease the strain – Maria gives her a grateful smile in response and hurries down the hallway.

Do they even have guest rooms, anymore? When her mother was alive, they had visitors all the time – cousins Luna barely remembers, family friends, scholars eager to talk to the Oracle about history and magic. Now it’s just Ravus.

Luna goes immediately to draw a warm bath, perching on the side of the tub as she does so. There’s a large bay window that looks out at the field of sylleblossoms, and she stares at the flowers and watches the sun begin to set as the water slowly fills the tub.

She’s so lost in her thoughts that she almost doesn’t notice the water is getting too close to the top, and turns it off quickly before shedding her remaining garments and slipping into the water with a contented sigh.

Traveling and using her powers to heal is wonderful, of course, but it does mean a lot of hurried cold showers or washing off in travel stop bathrooms with a handful of abrasive paper towels and tepid tap water. So when she gets home, she likes to soak off the travels and the sorrow of watching people worn ragged by the Starscourge – her powers can heal the body, but it doesn’t heal what the disease does to the mind. Nor can it erase from her  _ own _  mind the things she’s seen.

Would that it could.

***

In many cases, Luna will fall asleep in the bath as the ache eases out of her bones, soothed by the warm water. This time, though, she finds herself strangely restless. There’s a chill that seems to be unaffected by the heated bath, and she grows uneasy as the light beyond the window begins to fade with the approach of twilight.

Eventually she gives up and rises to her feet, water sluicing off her body, and goes to wrap a towel around herself. Luna usually follows up a bath with an equally long hot shower, but this time her motions are quick, perfunctory.

She’s dressed in fresh underthings and a dressing gown, brushing out her hair at her vanity, when there’s a knock on the door.

“Lunafreya.”

Ravus has always used her full name, even when they were children. She’s never asked him why. “Yes?”

“May I come in?”

She puts the heavy brush down – it has the elaborate unicorn emblem of House Nox Fleuret etched into the silver on the back – and studies her reflection. Despite the bath and the shower, her eyes look tired and there are circles beneath them, but there’s naught to be done about it. “Of course.”

Ravus is dressed in his military finery, the same unicorn stitched into the fine white leather of his coat, which is lined in their House’s distinctive purple. He looks handsome and dashing, and if she didn’t hate what that uniform stood for so much, she would tell him so.

“You should have told me you were not dressed,” he says, glancing away from her as she rises to greet him.

“It’s a dressing robe, Ravus,” she says, shrugging. He’s always been far more modest than her, which used to make their mother laugh. “I was not expecting to see you.” She smiles, hoping it reaches her eyes.

He doesn’t return it, but she hasn’t seen a smile on his face since he was sixteen -- that lazy summer day when their world turned to terror and ash. “It is an unexpected visit. My apologies for not sending word. I was uncertain of your precise location.”

That this is how things are between them brings her such sorrow, but she knows there is nothing to be done for it. He was born to the sword as her sacred protector, but instead he has become an absent jailor who nevertheless wears the keys to her prison cell worn tight against his heart.

“I was in Cleigne,” she says. “I am surprised the army does not appraise you of my location.”

“They do not always see fit to allow me access to exact information about your activities,” he says, stiffly, like he says everything when it comes to the Empire. “Maria told me she alerted you that we have a guest?”

“Indeed she did. The Imperial Chancellor, no less.” Her eyes go wide. “You’re keeping vaunted company, it seems.”

Ravus rolls his eyes, which makes him seem far more human and more the brother she remembers, the one who once responded to their mother’s outrage at finding him smoking cigarettes with,  _ Mother, really, it isn’t as if Lunafreya cannot heal any damage I might be doing. _

“Yes, well. It was not my idea, but I am hardly able to refuse. We shall have dinner at half-past seven. I realize you are tired and that this is likely an imposition, but it would be best if you attended.”

“Of course.” She understands that a visit from someone as important as the Chancellor is not something she can escape by claiming weariness from the road.

Ravus stares at her. There’s something in the way he’s looking at her, biting the edge of his lip like he did whenever he was in trouble and trying to think of a way out of it, that makes her heart ache a little for the sibling she used to know.

_ You are still a sworn sword, but for our mother’s murderers, not her daughter. Oh, Ravus. How is this what we have become? _

“Do stop looking at me like that,” Ravus mutters. “I am aware of your feelings about the Empire. I am, as always, merely seeking to keep you safe.”

“I am too tired for this conversation,” Luna tells him. “Seeing as how it never goes in any direction that satisfies either of us, perhaps we could simply agree not to have it.” She lays a careful hand on his arm. The muscles beneath are tight. His jaw looks as if it could cut glass. “It is good to see you.” She does mean that – she  _ wants _  to mean it. That must count for something.

“You as well. Of course.” His jaw eases, and he reaches out, carefully, and lays his gloved hand on hers. She cannot remember the last time he touched her of his own volition. “I – Lunafreya. I must ask you to keep your tongue when speaking with the Chancellor. It is said he has the ear of the Emperor in all things, and despite what his appearance or demeanor might suggest, he is an extremely dangerous man.”

Well, now she’s intrigued despite herself. Luna puts her hands on those poor souls afflicted by the curse of a vengeful god. She watched a man impale her mother on a sword when she was but a child. She has seen death in every facet and guise, and it has yet to send her running. But Ravus either underestimates her resolve or overestimates this Chancellor, for he looks as serious as she has ever seen him and is clearly waiting for her to promise to behave.

“Of course, Ravus. I’m hardly going to insult a visitor,” she says, and smiles despite herself at the way his pale eyebrows raise as if to say  _ it would not be the first time _ . “Mother’s second-cousin doesn’t count, he was a relation, not a guest. And he was a dead bore.”

As usual, any reference to family, their mother, or the life that was theirs before the Empire brought death to their door makes him go cold, lifeless as one of the statues that line the garden where he refuses to set foot.

“Chancellor Izunia has a fancy for old tales and history – no doubt that’s all he shall wish to speak to you about. It is unnecessary to discuss the details of your trips abroad, and you must  _ certainly _  not voice any of your Lucian royalist sympathies.”

_ Know your place and remember you are a political hostage _  would have been an easier way to say that, and less likely to make her want to punch Ravus. “Yes, I shall endeavor to keep my opinions and life experiences to myself in my own house, so as to not offend a delegate of the regime that seeks to manage and control them both.”

Ravus stares at her, and for a moment she is half-convinced he might strike her. Then, to her astonishment, he sighs and presses the palm of his hand to his forehead. “Were you to keep your acerbic tongue in a scabbard, you would have no need of my blade to protect you.”

The rare moment of good humor causes her to hold her tongue, though she dearly wishes to point out that to protect something is not the same as to stifle or imprison it. But she knows, deep down in her healer’s soul, that his actions are motivated from love of her, even if anger and guilt have colored that love with unrecognizable hues.

He puts both his hands on her shoulders. “Do your brother a favor, Sister, and keep a civil tone with Chancellor Izunia. I do not trust him, nor do I like the ease with which he could make decisions about your life that I could neither overturn nor counteract.”

_ Then perhaps you should not have tied your life and mine with a regime that plays with people as if they are nothing but toys to be taken out and put away when no longer amusing _ , she thinks, but is loath to ruin the first genuine interaction they have had in months, if not years. “I deal with the Scourge, Ravus. I am certain I can handle myself around one Imperial politician, as odious as he may be.”

Her brother moves closer, and almost – but not quite – brushes a kiss across her forehead. “Thank you. I regret much of what has come to pass between us, Lunafreya, but nothing is more important to me than you.”

She smiles and gives him a Healer’s blessing, hands warm on the stiff leather of his coat, the metal buckles pressed against her palms.

_ Would that I believed you, Brother. But we both know that I am second only to the bitterness in your heart, for if that were not true, you would have long ago turned to Lucis for aid instead of selling our House’s allegiance to the Empire. _

“I shall see you at dinner,” she says, and steps away.

He bows, courtly and elegant, before he turns and leaves.

He was never meant to lead armies, Ravus. He was meant to protect and serve, to steward the land and home, to keep peace in the Oracle’s name as his ancestors did for generations. But perhaps this is just one more inevitable crack in the foundation, one more sign that they live not in the time of tradition, but of prophecy.

And that means it is unavoidable – their mother’s death, Ravus’s defection, Luna’s tethering and this brutal war with Lucis. Her impending dinner with the Chancellor.

Sighing, Luna goes to her closet to find something to wear. She would prefer a meal and ice cream in bed, movies and a stack of novels to keep her company. A message sent to Noctis, perhaps, telling him of her recent trip to the outskirts of the kingdom that will one day be his.

Instead, she puts on a dress and goes to fix her hair.

***

By the time she joins Ravus in the drawing room, she feels better – less tired, though she’s starving and hopes that this Imperial Chancellor will not be put off by a woman with a hearty appetite. She long ago came to terms with her willowy frame and the fact she will never have the curves most women do, but that doesn’t mean she wants to look like a sack of skin arranged artfully over a frame of bone.

And while she has as good an appreciation for Crow’s Nest fries as anyone, she’d love something with a bit more substance and taste. Curative magic wreaks havoc on the metabolism.

Ravus has changed from his military garb into an elegant gray suit, his platinum hair worn neatly tied back with a white silk ribbon. It’s the dress of a noble, and she’s surprised to see him wearing it. He so rarely presents himself as anything other than an officer in the Imperial army.

“Lunafreya, there you are.” He takes her hand and turns with her arm tucked into his, the gesture a bit too proprietary for her taste, almost as if he’s trying to – what? Keep her from running at the Chancellor and strangling him? Honestly. “May I introduce you to our guest, Imperial Chancellor Ardyn Izunia. Chancellor Izunia, may I present my sister, Lady Lunafreya Nox Fleuret.”

Luna aims a polite smile at the other occupant of the room, and she realizes immediately upon seeing him what Ravus meant when he said to beware of him  _ despite his appearance _ . And why Maria saw fit to call him odd – twice.

Ardyn Izunia is, like Ravus, an uncommonly tall man – and broad-shouldered, though she cannot tell if that is his physique or the odd assemblage of clothing he’s wearing; a confusing array of scarves and mantles, all in various patterns and colors that combine to make him look like a hurricane in the placid, calm coolness of the elegant drawing room decorated in whites and cool blues.

He is wearing a hat, which he immediately removes to sweep her a bow, revealing a shock of messy hair that is, unless it’s some trick of the light, a vibrant shade of pure purple. His eyes, when he raises them to meet hers, are a disconcerting shade of yellow that look as cold as cut glass.

This is the Imperial Chancellor? This man, who dresses as if he should be enticing couples to step right up and try their luck at a rigged carnival game? She nearly laughs but then he smiles, and something cold slicks down her spine as she thinks of those creatures that live in the deep seas, the ones that flash a light to distract their prey from rows upon rows of jagged, sharp teeth.

“Lady Lunafreya,” he says, in a voice that sounds as warm as caramel poured over sunlight and yet, somehow, calls to mind those same chilling and lifeless depths. “What a delight to make your acquaintance at last.”

He does not offer to shake her hand, for which she is profoundly grateful. She does not want to touch him, and yet, she finds herself moving toward him as if unable to stop.

_ Anglerfish. That’s what they’re called. That is what this man is, an anglerfish, and though I should know better here I am, swimming toward its false and deadly light. _

Luna tries to clear the sudden cobweb-tangle of thoughts and says, “Imperial Chancellor. How honored we are to have you visit us.”

“Please, please, I assure you, the honor is all mine.” Chancellor Izunia’s smile is, she’s certain, supposed to be friendly. Nothing about him should be causing her to look at him like he’s a starved coeurl amidst a den of injured baby rabbits, and yet.

Something about him makes conjuring up a prey metaphor horrifically easy.

_ It is simply that Ravus told you he was dangerous. You’ve been traveling and interacting with Ravus is always emotionally exhausting. And you have no love for the Empire, who this man serves. _

_ Also perhaps you should ease up on the nature documentaries. _

“Have you been to Tenebrae before?” she asks, and she has the oddest feeling that he knows exactly how discomforted she is and why, which is infuriating because, other than his position in the Empire,  _ she _  doesn’t know why he’s affecting her so.

“A great many years ago,” he says, returning his hat to his head. She cannot figure out how old he is, and that’s odd. Her powers being what they are, she’s usually rather adept at getting a read on someone’s age, which of course can, and often does, affect one’s health. “A lovely country. I had quite forgotten how much.”

“Indeed it is. I think that every time I return.”  _ As I am mandated to do by your orders, no doubt. _  “And you are from…Izunia, hmm. I’m not familiar with the surname. Is it Niflheimian?” He certainly doesn’t look like he’s from Niflheim, though honestly, the man looks like he could be from everywhere – or nowhere – all at once.

“Oh, no,” he says, waving a hand. His shirt is as odd as the rest of his ensemble – there’s an undershirt that is strikingly old-fashioned, with a high-collar and ruffles, ending in sleeves that fan out around hands encased in fingerless black gloves. The entirety of his person is a bizarre clash of modernism and antiquity, from the pinstripes to the jacquard print to the boots that remind her unpleasantly of a soldier. “As it happens, I had something of a falling out with my family, oh, ages ago. So I decided it best to abandon my family name in favor of one without such unpleasant connotations.

There is something oddly freeing to Luna about that idea, especially to someone who was born under the weight of a family name and all its attendant complexities and obligations. But she cannot help thinking it is one more piece in the jumbled together  _ thing _  that is smiling at her in her drawing room, and that’s when she realizes, quite simply, that  _ this is not a man _ .

Chills rush over her. His smile widens, and then he  _ winks _  at her.

Ravus clears his throat. She wonders if she’s been staring. “Shall we make our way to the dining room?” Ravus asks, giving her a warning glare.

“Yes, certainly,” the Chancellor says, and holds out his arm to escort her. “Lady Lunafreya, if i may?”

It is more than proper, it is practically protocol -- her brother might be a prince and she a princess, but they are nobles in a captive kingdom that exists only at the whim of another. The Chancellor outranks them, lack of noble title aside, and is their guest. It is only proper that he escort her. But Luna does not  _ want _  him anywhere near her, does not want to touch him, yet she finds herself reaching out to place a hand on his arm without quite realizing she’s doing it.

_ And then, having lured its prey, _  the narrator of the deep sea program intones,  _ the anglerfish opens its jaws and goes in for the kill. _

She takes a breath, but all she feels beneath her fingers is the fabric of his coat and the hint of musculature. He smells good, like outside and fresh air, his cologne a mix of sharp notes such as citrus, mint and eucalyptus.

“Are you feeling unwell? Lord Ravus did mention you had been traveling in your duties as Oracle. I hope you don’t feel as if your attendance is required, it was not my intent to make you uncomfortable.”

Luna glances up at him and says without thinking, “Wasn’t it?”

His smile is far less friendly and yet, she imagines, far more genuine. “Well,” he says, patting her hand as if she is an amusing child or small animal, “Perhaps just a  _ little _ .” He leans in, closer, as if they are sharing some sort of secret. “Be at ease, Oracle. If I meant you harm you would know it. Keep your considerable gifts away from me, and you and I shall get along splendidly.”

Something strange is happening, for though they are still walking the air feels wrong, still, like it’s been frozen. Ravus must be directly behind them, but she no longer hears his footsteps.

“I would never seek to heal those who do not wish it,” she says, truthfully. She wonders what is the matter with him. She wonders what  _ isn't _ .

“Wonderful,” he says, and pats her on the hand again. “Now, how did you find your

Imperial escort on your journey into Lucis? As Chancellor, I of course support your duties as Oracle, and while I understand how tiring it must be to travel with an armed guard, it is the unfortunate realities of war that necessitate such things.…”

Luna can hear Ravus walking behind them. They’ve entered the dining room, and the Chancellor is pulling out her chair. Everything is as it should be. She takes her seat, gives him a polite nod and makes the appropriate responses about  _ yes, the escort is fine, thank you _ , demurs that she appreciates his dedication to her service despite ongoing hostilities, and yes, she too yearns for a time when the world is at peace.

The heightened sense of awareness -- the danger and that breathless feeling of lightheadedness -- is gone by the time the first course is served. Chancellor Izunia is charming, engaging enough that she is not bored or angry, and none of that earlier  _ danger _  is coming through at all. He seems to be an eccentric man with a strange name and a great deal of power, and she’s starting to wonder if she imagined everything that came before she sat down to eat.

At some point, though, she notices that while he sips occasionally from his glass of wine, while the servants bring and clear dishes from in front of him without comment, he has eaten nothing.

He notices her noticing, and there it is again, that smile from earlier, the one that makes her wonder what he really is and why he’s here. That smile that brings to mind predators deflecting attention to something harmless and shiny, away from the parts of them that can tear you to shreds.

***

She has a drink with them in the study after dinner, some rich warm brandy that makes her dizzy and tastes like smoke and leather. It is a mockery of the sort of life she does not really lead; she is not a gentle noblewoman and Ravus not the lord of the manor, the Chancellor not an important guest come to call on the local gentry.

Perhaps she would have been able to expend more of an effort to pretend, had she not so recently returned from healing. Perhaps not. That life does not necessarily appeal to her, either. It seems just another sort of trap.

Eventually she makes her excuses to the Chancellor, and Ravus rises to escort her to her room. Luna lets the smile drop from her face the second they are alone.

“So,” Ravus says. “That is Chancellor Izunia. My thanks, Lunafreya, for not regaling him with your various and sundry complaints against the Empire.” He gives her a suspicious look. “And now I must inquire – are you unwell? Because I did not believe for one second you would actually stay quiet, when presented with a man who serves the Empire in such a fashion as Izunia.”

“That man serves no Empire,” she says, surprising herself with the surety of her conviction. “That man serves no one but himself. And I feel free to voice my disapproval with you because you are my brother, Ravus. I am not so rash that I would risk your safety by suggesting the Nox Fleurets are a hair's breadth away from rebellion.”

“Gods, Luna,” Ravus mutters. “Don’t even joke of such things. There are plenty in Gralea who do not like how far a foreign prince has risen in the army, and it must be said that while he is a dangerous and strange man, Chancellor Izunia has, for whatever reason, chosen to show me some favor.”

Luna gives him a look. “As I said, Ravus. I would not be so brash as to put you in harm’s way.”  _ You are doing that enough for the both of us. _  Luna does not want to feel grateful for Chancellor Izunia for anything – she does not want the man to sleep in her home, under her roof, beneath the stars in her sky. “It isn’t even that he’s – well, yes, he’s dangerous and strange, but there’s something a bit off about him. Did you not notice?”

Ravus has the blood of the Oracle in his veins. Whatever is  _ wrong _  with the Chancellor, she cannot help but feel it is on a level far beyond the mundane and that Ravus should, theoretically, be able to sense it.

“A bit off…you mean despite his abysmal fashion sense?”

Perhaps the readings of signs and omens, the fear of predators lurking in daylight, is only for her to notice. Her brother is a military man, concerned now with far more practical things. “You did say not to let his appearance fool me. Though I confess, I kept waiting for the moment he would pull a rabbit out of that hat.”

“Yes, well, given that he is the man from whose mind the Magitek soldiers spawned, I should prefer, I think, not to see anything else he may come up with,” Ravus says. He pauses in front of her door. “I shall make your excuses in the morning, if you wish. I daresay we shall depart for Gralea after luncheon. You need not suffer his company again, if you do not wish.”

She does not wish. But nor does she wish this to be her last moment with her brother, when she fears so for what the future holds for him. Her dream drifts at the very edges of her consciousness – the cold floor, his sightless eyes, a sword that is not his stained with blood that is. “I should like to have breakfast with  _ you _ , Ravus. And the Chancellor is…well. I’m certain that I am just tired, is all.”

Ravus bows over her hand in a way that is charmingly old-fashioned and reminds her sweetly of better days. “Doubtful. He is a presence, even when well-rested. Believe me, I know.”

Luna bids him good night, and watches as he heads not to his room, but back the direction from whence they came. Returning to the Chancellor, no doubt. She wonders if he was simply waiting for her to leave, so they could discuss whatever it is they intend to discuss. For she is no stranger to her brother’s machinations, and he has neatly avoided explaining  _ why _  the Chancellor is there in the first place.

There be something Ravus wants. She fears both what that is, and what he might have to surrender to get it. What else do either of them have left to give? What more can the Empire possibly take?

She could, she supposes, do what she did as a child and hide just outside the door. Or she could simply claim she was not as tired as she thought and join them again for another drink, but she thinks they will not speak of whatever it is in her presence. And the thought of sneaking about and listening like an errant child does not sit well with her – both on principle, and the thought she might hear something she does not want to know.

***

Luna can’t sleep.

She’s lying there in bed, exhausted and surrounded by more comfort than she’s had in weeks -- soft pillows, cool, crisp linen sheets, foam mattress and a warm feather duvet -- and yet she is tossing and turning as surely as if she were sleeping on a rock under a plastic tarp.

Every time she feels too warm she kicks off the covers, only to catch a chill and bundle back up again. Her cheeks are flushed and her legs shift restlessly against the sheets, and if it were anyone else she would swear they were suffering from a fever. But she isn’t sick, she’s just…

Affected. Restless.  _ Wanting. _

Finally, Luna gets out of bed and pulls on a pair of loose cotton pants and a plain white tank top. She gathers her hair up into a ponytail and slips out of her room, listening for any sound before she makes her way across the hall and down the staircase.

There is no one in the drawing room, or the study, and the dining room is quiet and empty. The moon is high in the sky, shining off the high glass windows, and through it, Luna can see the field of sylleblossoms --

\-- and the figure of a man standing in the shadows, his coat, scarves and mantle fluttering behind him like wings in the dark.

***

Luna pushes the door from the drawing room open and walks barefoot over cool stones to the grass, and then beyond to the field where the man waits. If he is surprised by her appearance, it does not show.

“Do you know why these flowers bloom here, and yet nowhere else on Eos?”

Luna stares out at the sylleblossoms, a field of silvery blue beneath the cold moonlight. “No. As it happens, I don’t. We used to have horticulturalists visit, and they wanted to know the same thing. Do  _ you _  know why?”

“Long ago, when the Hexatheon took to arms against one another, it is said they fought their final battle in the sky above this very place.” He glances over at her, his gold eyes gleaming like a cat’s. “So the soil was nourished by the ichor of their divine blood, and the blossoms the tears they shed for the ravages their conflict caused to the land and the creatures that dwelled upon it.”

“I’ve never heard that story,” Luna says, interested despite herself. Ravus had told her that the Chancellor had an interest in history, but this is a story even she has not heard. “Though my mother always suspected it was something in the soil composition, so perhaps it is a fanciful explanation for a mundane reason.”

“You think the Gods and their attendant strife merely a fancy?” he asks. “You, who swore holy oaths to speak for them as Oracle?”

There are many who forget that speaking for the gods is what it truly means to be an Oracle. “Of course I believe in the gods. But not that they weep flowers. Do you believe that, Chancellor Izunia?”

“Chancellor Izunia would tell you that he has neither the time nor inclination to waste on mythology.” The brim of his hat throws unkind shadows over his haughty, regal face. “Ardyn, though, might have a different answer.”

Wonderful. Did he mean to suggest he was possessed of multiple personalities? It would certainly explain his wardrobe. “You wish me to ask Ardyn, then?”

“I wish to converse with a name that is mine, Lady Lunafreya, and not a clever and convenient lie.”

“Very well,” she says. Inside, her magic begins to shift and tighten, as if it is tying itself into knots. “Do you believe the gods weep flowers flowers, Ardyn?”

“No, I cannot say that I do. Though I think the part I do not believe is that the gods care enough about humanity to weep at all, not what may or may not constitute their tears.” The curve of his mouth is cruel. “But perhaps you, who are destined to speak with them, might ask for the truth -- and receive it.”

“The gods do not yet speak to me,” she says, though why she offers this truth to him, she does not know. “I hear a strangeness in the air, sometimes. Less like distant thunder, and more like a rustle in the leaves.”

“Yes. The thunder will be next, heralding the storm to come.” He stares up at the sky, hands shoved in his pockets. “And afterward, the quiet destruction that humanity, in their eternal need for  _ hope _ , calls  _ the calm _ .”

How odd that he says “humanity” as if he is not a part of it. “My brother told me to watch my tongue around you. He worried I would offend you with my talk of the Empire, and my royalist tendencies. Strange that what we would speak of is metaphors and gods.”

“Royalist tendencies? Ah, my dear Lady Lunafreya, believe me when I tell you that you’re not the only one who has those.” He laughs as if that’s a punchline to a joke she didn’t hear. “And your brother thinks his stoicism sufficient to hide his ill feelings toward the Empire, but they are far from secret. But do not worry. It matters little to me if Lord Ravus wishes to lick the boot resting on his throat or bite at it. In the end, the result is the same.”

Luna does not like the idea of Ravus being complicit in his own enslavement, but it seems pointless to argue that he is not. “I wish that he would not have kneeled and bared his throat so easily.” It is a private thought, one she has not admitted to anyone – and she doesn’t quite understand why she’s admitting it to  _ him _  of all people.

“He would have lost more than just his pride, should he have chosen to fight,” Ardyn says. “Is that what you wish to discuss, my lady? Ravus and his military career?”

In truth, she is tired of the whole conversation about her brother. “No. I only wonder if you will give him the favor he asked for.”

“And why do you think he asked me for anything?” Ardyn asks, reaching down to snag a sylleblossom and tug it out of the earth. Luna feels the loss of it like a physical ache, as if he tugged out her soul instead of one flower from amidst thousands.

“I know my brother,” she says, thinking through the evening. “He dressed tonight as a noble, not a soldier, which he dislikes. He hates being reminded that he is first son of a conquered house. And he did not know where I was, but he knew I was traveling – no doubt he agreed to bring you here, hoping I would not be in residence. So, I am to assume that he asked you for some favor and you, for whatever reason, only saw fit to grant it if you could visit his ancestral home?”

“You’ve quite the strategic mind, my lady, but you’re not entirely correct. The favor is mine, though it  _ was _  my suggestion that we visit Ravus’s ancestral home.” Ardyn reaches out, tucking the sylleblossom behind her ear. “I wanted him to remember what was at stake. What he knelt and bared his throat for. You might say that I offered him a chance to remove that boot for good, even.”

“To replace the Emperor’s boot with your own?” And now she is doing exactly what Ravus warned her against, but she does not think it is ties to Iedolas Aldercapt that makes this man a danger.

“My dear,” Ardyn says fondly, and his fingers drop down to caress her neck with fingers that are colder than they should be in such a temperate evening. “The Emperor’s boot might as well be my own, which I am sure your brother made clear to you when he bid you watch your tongue around me. But if we are seeking some sort of metaphor, let’s say it isn’t a boot I seek to place at your brother’s throat, but a sword I wish to put in his hand.”

“He already has a sword,” Luna replies, breathless, as Ardyn drags his two fingers across her throat like a threat. “Chancellor --”

“Come now, I did ask you to call me Ardyn,” he says, and his eyes are no longer cold glass but the bright tip of a flame, inferno-hot. “Chancellor Izunia and Lady Lunafreya have no place here.”

“Then who does?” She is sure he must be able to feel her swallow, his fingers pressed as they are to her throat.

“Ardyn, and the Oracle? No, that sounds a bit like a tawdry adventure series, does it not? Ardyn and…may I be so bold as to call you Luna?”

She doubts it would make a difference if she were to say no, and strangely, she doesn't mind him using the nickname. Luna reaches up and catches his fingers with her own. “What is it you want with me, Ardyn?”

“Did you know that long ago, when adversaries were fated to meet in battle, they would take time to exchange pleasantries beforehand?” Ardyn says, a strange, dreamy smile on his face. “So I was told, at any rate. My experience with war has always been with the terrible things men do to each other while engaged in it, not with the civility and traditional kindnesses enacted beforehand.”

“Who  _ are _  you?” she asks, though she has no expectation that he will answer.

“Oh, no one really,” he says, which of course, she does not believe. Ardyn steps closer, his other hand coming around the back of her neck. “Let’s not waste time with questions. I’ve never had the chance to meet an adversary before a battle. I would much rather focus on these pleasantries I’ve heard so much about.”

The idea that she would be this man’s adversary is absurd. “When, in the history of ever, has a healer ever been an adversary to anyone?”

Ardyn throws back his head and laughs. The sound is wild, feral, like something is howling. “Since when, indeed?” he says, and pulls her forward to kiss her.

His mouth is as cold as his fingers, and he tastes -- strange, like black licorice and earth and frost, the kind that shows up unexpected in spring and strangles flowers mid-bloom.

Luna kisses back, a bit hesitant and uncertain in her inexperience, and she wonders if he can tell she’s never done this before. She wonders why she is even  _ allowing _  this, much less kissing back.

One of his hands settles on her waist, and his fingers grip bruising-tight through the thin material of her tank top. “Look at you,” he murmurs, cool lips brushing over her skin, his voice sweet and dark like poison. “All the power of the Astrals, and such a little thing. All sharp angles like a lightning rod waiting for the storm.”

His mouth moves down to her neck, his fingers pushing higher, tracing over ribs she knows are too prominent, the bottoms of her breasts she knows are too small. Luna has heard the whispers on trains, in shops, everywhere she’s ever gone --  _ she’s far too thin, no one wants a woman who looks like that _ .

Ardyn does not seem to share this opinion. His hands, cold as they are, are near worshipful as they caress and stroke. The evidence of his enjoyment is clear enough against her, even through her loose pajama pants and his excess array of outerwear.

“I -- my body was designed as a tool for the Astrals. It was not meant for pleasure.” Her fingers tangle in the fabric of his coat as his leather-clad palm curves around her breast, the tips of his fingers cooler than the leather and tugging lightly on her nipple.

“What fool told you that?” he asks, biting gently at her neck as he caresses her. “The gods? Of course they would want you to turn your back on something as earthly and mundane as sex and physical pleasure. Far easier to die for their whims if you don’t know what it’s like to live, isn’t it?”

She shivers in his arms, uncertain, aware that he is offering her something that she might never otherwise experience. She has met attractive men and women before, but mostly it is in her official position as healer and Oracle – it seems the very height of blasphemy to barter the gods’ gift for her own pleasure.

Who else does she see, locked away as she is in the prison of her childhood home?

Soon the gods will wake and her true duties will begin, and she will likely not live  to see the day the Chosen King ascends. She long ago came to terms with the briefness of her earthly existence, but does that mean she should not take something for herself before giving all that she is to the gods and their plans?

“Are you offering to show me this, then?” She asks, cautious, because she cannot be sure, even now, that he does not mean her harm. There is something about the way he looks at her that makes her think he hates her, but surely that is not right – for his hands are sure onare gentle and teasing on her body and his mouth on her neck makes her shiver with want. What man would give this to someone he disliked?

“Why, Luna. It would be my pleasure.” Ardyn pulls back and smiles at her, and yes, there it is again, that odd  _ dislike _  that she has neither the ability or the desire to suss out at the moment.

She waits to see if the gods will choose to have a say, will tell her to take herself inside and away from this temptation. But they are ever-silent, and so she makes her choice.

Luna starts to work at his coat. “Show me what I have been missing, then.”

He takes her hands in his and pulls them away from his body. “There are a few rules we must follow, I’m afraid. One is that you must trust me to do this in a way that will not…cause the inflammation of certain darker passions best left banked.”

Luna arches her brows, wondering why he chooses such convoluted phrasing and what on earth he means. “Darker passions, such as…?” A thought occurs to her, and she laughs outright. “Do you think the sight of your naked body will incite me to murder, Ardyn?”

His smile is wicked incarnate, and he laughs along with her. “Oh, no, I doubt that very much. But call it a preference of my own, and allow me to take lead in this particular dance. If you do, I promise you shall enjoy it.” Ardyn slides his fingers into her mouth, then moves them in and out in a gesture so overtly sexual that her knees weaken. “As with any good devil worth his horns, I have many temptations to entice you into sin.”

“Very well, devil,” she says lightly, murmuring the words around his fingers. “Entice me.”

He pulls his hand away and yanks her closer to him with sudden roughness, hands sliding down to cover the curves of her ass in her soft cotton pants. He lifts her easily and her arms go around his neck as carries her over to a nearby bench.

The moonlight shines upon it like a spotlight. In her mind she thinks she should be wary of daemons, though holy runes are etched around the perimeter and they should keep them safe. And she cannot help but think of all the daemons that might prowl about in the night, she has willingly offered herself to the worst of them all.

When he sits down, he turns her so that she is seated in his lap with her back to his chest. He arranges her legs on either side of his, which makes her face heat at the thought of how wanton she must look, even fully dressed.

“You may touch yourself, if you like,” he says, right against her ear and oh, his voice sounds like every bad idea she’s ever had, every rebellious thought and every sweet pleasure she’s found by herself in the dark.

Luna doesn’t know, exactly, what to do with this permission. Her fantasies have always been rather vague; half-remembered scenes of intimacy from the few movies she’s watched, snippets of books or stories she found arousing. “I’m -- I would have this be good for you, too,” she says, peeking over her shoulder. It is not within her nature to take without giving back.

The intensity of his gaze feels like fire – that, along with his voice, are the only things about him that are warm. “Oh, you needn’t worry about that.” He pulls at the tie in her hair, and she’s briefly aware as the elastic and the sylleblossom both fall to the ground, discarded. “But I would very much like to see what you do, when you’re alone and aching in your bed. How you bring yourself to ecstasy.”

Luna takes Ardyn’s hand and carries it down between her thighs – though she does so over her loose pajama pants, not quite bold enough yet to push his hand beneath her clothes. Even through the cotton his touch feels like a shock of electricity, jumping like a spark over her skin. “Oh, that’s -- oh.” She drops her head back on his shoulder, biting her own lip, and her face is on fire from how hotly she’s blushing.

But she laces her fingers around his, and shows him how she likes to be touched.

“How lovely,” he murmurs, his other hand slipping under her tank to play with her breasts. “You’re already wet, darling. I’m terribly flattered.”

She makes a noise of protest when he pulls his hand away -- even her own fingers clasping at his wrist doesn’t keep it where she wants it, he’s absurdly strong -- but that dies when she watches him tug the glove off his hand and toss it down on the ground. “Perhaps it might feel better with less between us.”

He takes her hand in his, clearly waiting for her to put it back where she wants it…and not on top of her clothes, this time. She stalls as she works up her nerve, idly rubbing her thumb over the calluses on his fingers and wondering how he got them.

She frowns at how chilled his skin is, even now. “Your hands, they’re very cold.”

“Poor circulation,” he says, and she knows it’s a lie. “Do you wish to stop?”

That he asks is a surprise, though perhaps it shouldn’t be. She doesn’t think he has any real interest in forcing her, and his excitement seems to stem from her giving in to something she wants, as for the most part, he’s let her set the pace according to her comfort.

_ He did say he was a devil. And is not their very purpose to lead the godly astray, the chaste temptation? _

Luna takes a deep breath and slides his hand down, over the skin of her stomach under both her pajama pants and the thin cotton underwear. His eyes stay locked on hers as his fingers slide through her slick folds, and she can feel him press his hips up, grinding the hard ridge of his cock against the swell of her ass.

She hooks one arm around the back of his neck, her breath escaping in short, gasping little pants as she writhes on his lap. This is easier to do herself, simply because she knows where and how to touch -- but having someone else do it is its own special rush, and his fingers might be cold but they’re big and the calluses feel so good, he’s so very close to the perfect spot --

“Do feel free to show me just how you like it,” he murmurs, kissing at her neck. “And don’t worry if you wish to make noise. No one will hear us.”

He sounds more certain of that than he should be, but she doesn’t argue. She reaches down and curves her hand against his once more, maneuvering his fingers where she wants them. “That -- mm, yes, right  _ there _  --”

“Does it feel good?” He’s resting his chin on her shoulder, watching his hand move beneath her clothing. “You’re so wet, darling. I’m aching to press my cock between those slick thighs.”

She’s grabbing at his wrist, not to stop him but hurry him up, so close -- she’s close --

“Who do you think about, when you do this to yourself?”

Luna can barely remember her  _ own _  name, so close is she. Her breathing is all wrecked as she holds her inhale, wanting nothing more than for him to rub faster, a little harder, and push her over the edge. “I -- no one specific.”

“Do me a favor sometime, hmm? Touch yourself and think about me, and this lovely night we’re sharing together.” He laughs softly. “You’re very close, aren’t you?” His other hand, still wearing the fingerless glove, is also beneath her pants but this one is just resting on the inside of her thigh, holding her open though there’s no need, she’s certainly not trying to move away.

She thinks maybe he likes how he can feel the muscles in her thigh trembling.

“Yes, I – I will,” Luna says, sweat dampening her brow. She’s got one hand in his hair as she curls her fingers around his wrist, forcing his hand to rub her like she wants -- or tries, because he’s holding back, slowing and no, no, why is he -- “I -- please,” she moans, mindless, her whole body taut with need and trembling.

“ _ Promise _  me, Luna. Promise me some night, weeks from now, you’ll remember us together and how good my hand felt between your legs.” There’s a roughness to his voice, curling around his words like barbed wire. “Think about begging me to make you come, how very desperate you were….will you do that?”

“Yes,” she moans, willing to promise anything if he’ll just go back to rubbing her like she wants, like she  _ needs _ … “I – I promise, Ardyn –"

“Good girl,” he murmurs, kissing at her ear. “And I shall do the same, during some dark, endless night when the time is right for such selfish indulgences. Take my pleasure while thinking of you, so flushed and lovely on my lap.” With that, he stops talking and gives in, lets her push and pull his hand how she wants, working it for her pleasure until finally it breaks.

She comes against his hand and her orgasm is deep and full, contracting and pulsing in hot waves that leave her breathless and gasping. Her legs are shaking and her toes curl, calves tensing and seizing up, mouth open in a soundless scream. When it ebbs she collapses back against him, twitching, the sound of her own ragged breathing loud in the stillness of the night.

After a few seconds, she realizes he is stroking her hair back from her sweat-dampened face. She blinks her eyes open and stretches, body languid and muscles easing, too replete from her pleasure to feel as embarrassed as she knows she should. “Mmm. That was -- thank you.”

“No need to thank me. I quite enjoyed it, I assure you.” Ardyn smiles like a king on a newly-conquered throne, and as she watches he raises his hand to his mouth and licks his fingers, one after the other, like he’s savoring her taste.

He reaches down and tips her face up, then kisses her as if he wants to share. Luna kisses back, shyly touching her tongue to his, and his fingers tighten for a moment on her chin before he pulls away.

Luna tries to turn around and straddle him in truth, but he shakes his head, re-settling her with her back to his chest like before. This time, though, he arranges it so that her legs are between his, her pants shoved down along with her underwear.

She can feel him working at his belt behind her so she reaches back, wanting to help. He takes her hand and carries it down, filling it with himself and showing her how to stroke him. She has never touched this part of a man before, but even she, inexperienced as she is, knows that it should be much warmer than it is.

She must be a quick study for he drops his hand and lets her carry on alone, his breath spilling hot and fast against her shoulder as his cock grows impossibly harder under her touch.

“Tighten your hand, darling,” he murmurs, voice dark as night. “I prefer a bit of a rougher touch.”

She does as instructed, thrilling a bit at being able to touch him this way, a shade past what she would think would be comfortable. When she rubs her thumb over the head of his cock she feels a bead of wetness at the tip, and the noise he makes comes from somewhere deep in his chest like a growl. She does it again, and again, and the sound of her hand moving over his hard cock is far more arousing than she ever would have thought.

Ardyn’s hands begin to wander as she strokes him, over her breasts and between her legs, rubbing her still-sensitive clit and lower, teasing against her opening where she is slick and wet for him. “Do you wish me to take you, my dear? For I can certainly find pleasure in your lovely hands, or from that pretty mouth, if you would prefer.”

The idea of going to her knees in a field of her favorite flowers and putting her mouth on him is strangely thrilling, but she has every intention of experiencing this to the fullest. “I would have you finish this as it is meant to be finished,” she says, and it is nice to feel him react to that, the way his cock twitches in her hand and the sudden, sweet-sharp sting of his teeth as he nips at her shoulder.

“Ah, if we but had more time, I would show you the many, many ways one can  _ finish _  this with another.” He smiles against her shoulder before kissing up her neck, to her ear. “But I take your meaning. Only ask me to fuck you, and I shall do so forthwith.”

She would laugh, maybe, at his use of the word  _ forthwith _  -- honestly, he talks so strangely, and even more so the further lost to pleasure he becomes – but she is blushing again, uncertain if she can make herself ask like he wants.

Luna has used the word  _ fuck _  before, of course. When she stubs a toe on one of the heavy pieces of furniture around her home, when she cannot get the cap off a bottle of Ebony, when she drops yet another salsa-laden chip on her favorite white dress. But she has never used the word like this before, and no doubt that is why he wishes to hear her do it.

Luna has come to far to back out, now. And besides – she does want him to fuck her. She wants him to fuck her with the cock she’s been stroking into readiness, wants him to press the heavy weight of it inside her, wants to tumble over into pleasure again with it buried deep.

She isn’t ashamed that she wants this, so she’ll be damned if she’s afraid to ask for it.

As determined as she is, it still takes her a moment before she draws in a slow breath and says, on the exhale, “Please, I – I want you to. Fuck me.”

Huh. That wasn’t – that wasn’t hard, was it? In fact, just hearing herself say it gave her a pleasant shiver, made a low throb of arousal curl in her stomach. She leans her head back so she is looking up into his strange, bright eyes, and smiles. “Fuck me, Ardyn.”

It’s a bit harder to say it right  _ to _  him, but ah, how freeing it is! This may be a terrible idea – no, it is most  _ certainly _  a terrible idea, and he is, without a doubt, a terrible man – but it is  _ her _  terrible idea, and he is her choice, and she has made it.

So be it.

“As my lady wishes," he says, and smiles so slow, so  _ pleased _ , that she thinks all he's wanted all along was just to hear her ask for it.

Ardyn doesn’t bother to strip her, just pulls her up with his seemingly unnatural strength so he can press his cock against her, rub it in the slick wetness of her slit and tease her with his fingers on her clit.

It occurs to her that there are ramifications to having sex with a man, and she pauses, realizing she should have asked this far before they got to this point. “I did not come out here with any preventative measures on my person,” she says, and almost laughs at how prim it sounds compared to her rather wanton  _ fuck me, Ardyn,  _ from earlier.

He blinks at her, and it’s the first time she’s managed to throw him off balance. When her meaning sets in, he laughs – but the sound is strange, almost bitter. “You needn’t worry about that. I’m incapable of having children.”

There is always the possibility he is lying, but something about the way he’d laughed makes her think that he’s not. Or maybe she’s just too eager to get on with it, and what’s one more bad decision on top of the monumentally bad ones she’s made with him, already?

He does wait, poised with his cock rubbing against her, and she gives a slight nod to show she intends to continue.

“I’m told this part may be a bit painful. I shall endeavor to make it fleeting. When you think back on this night with me, the last thing I want you to remember is my causing you pain.”

It does hurt, a little -- he’s a well-endowed man, his cock in proportion to the rest of him, but he’s patient as he urges her down on top of him, stroking her clit and kissing at the spot on her neck that makes her shiver. When she’s fully seated, he grabs her hips and tilts her, bending her over slightly so she’s resting most of her weight on her feet as he starts moving.

The first few thrusts pull a sound out of her that isn’t pleasure, but she gives a brief shake of her head to indicate that he shouldn’t stop. 

It will, she thinks, feel good when she gets used to it.

He steadies her with one hand on her hip and the other between her legs, rubbing her clit while he begins to pick up the pace and oh, yes, now it goes from uncomfortable to strange to  _ good _ , so quickly it makes her head spin. Her small sounds of discomfort turn quickly into gasps of pleasure, and he takes it as the sign it is that he can start to fuck her harder.

It’s nothing like what she thought, when she imagined doing this with some faceless, nameless lover in the privacy of her bedchamber. There’s honesty in the simple give-and-take of it, and it seems suddenly very inconsequential that she does not like, does not even really  _ know _ , the man who is taking her with such perfect ferocity.

It isn’t about him as a person. It’s about him giving her this moment of blissful pleasure, satisfying a human need that might have gone forever denied.

It helps that he clearly has experience and knows what he’s doing. He is, in fact,  _ very _  good at it.

Eventually he takes her by the hips and urges her to ride him while he thrusts up into her. Luna strokes herself while she moves with him, until she’s making caught noises that sound a great deal like he might be murdering her instead of pleasuring her past all sense.

Ardyn fucks her like he could do it for hours, hard and without pause, whispering filthy things in her ear like a threat. “You feel so good on my cock, darling. So tight, I’m so  _ honored _  to be the first to take you, ah, are you going to come for me? Do it, yes, let me feel you, be loud for me, that’s it -”

She comes twice on his cock while he fucks her, and she’s loud, she feels completely out of her element, almost animalistic with how she’s rutting back against him. She’s all sweat-covered and panting, her hands gripping his knees and digging into the fabric of his pants and  _ how is he still wearing so many clothes _ , she’s so hot she feels like she’s burning up into ash --

“Once more,  _ sweetheart _ ,” he croons, and there’s something so terribly, awfully  _ wrong _  about the way he says the endearment, it sounds perilously close to a curse. And now it’s his fingers against her clit instead of her own, rubbing her with unerringly perfect pressure and speed. “Come again for me, let me feel you.”

She does -- she couldn’t stop it if she tried. She’s so weak from pleasure she can barely keep herself up, and she realizes that he’s supporting her weight entirely as he fucks her on his lap, so hard that it’s starting to feel like too much, she’s overstimulated and at least he’s not rubbing between her legs anymore because she’s not sure she would be able to stand it. Ardyn pulls her down onto his cock, over and over again, and his teeth are buried in her shoulder and for the first time since all of this started something  _ hurts _ .

The sounds he’s making are almost terrifying, grunts and a growling sort of hiss that sounds inhuman. One of his hands is still gripping her thigh like a vise, the other is around the back of her neck so that she can’t turn around.

Luna relaxes into it, and she reaches behind her even though she can’t see, pressing her hand against his chest like she’s trying to soothe him. She breathes out, moves with him, and despite the slightly concerning sounds he’s making and the roughness, it does start to feel good again and she realizes with a start why that is -- her magic is rousing, unknotting and uncurling and starting to work its way out.

It wants to heal.

It wants to heal  _ Ardyn _ .

There’s a pause, and then she finds herself jerked back so she’s upright in his lap, his hand loosely gripping at the base of her throat. He’s panting and his cock is still hard but his hands are so very cold, there’s not a drop of sweat on him despite his exertions but perhaps most disturbing of all, there is no heartbeat beneath the palm she still has pressed to his chest.

“Control it," he hisses. "Believe me when I tell you that there is nothing here for you to heal.”

She pulls her magic back with effort, and as she does so, he withdraws his cock from her and pushes her forward with a shove. She turns her head in time to see him fisting himself and coming on the ground with a low groan, head thrown back. It’s a lovely image, that big body of his shuddering as he's caught up in pleasure.

The evening air is starting to feel cool against her heated skin, and she can only imagine what a mess she is. The thought makes her smile. She feels debauched, and  _ damned _  good about it.

“My dear. Let me assist you.” Ardyn’s voice is quiet, his hands gentle as he reaches for her. Any hint of his earlier viciousness, or inhuman  _ strangeness _ , is gone. He tugs her pants and her underwear up and pulls her shirt down, smoothes his hand over hair and even combs the tangles out with his fingers.

It’s very relaxing. She leans back against him, her eyes sliding closed as her breathing evens out and he plays with her hair. She wonders if she will, at some point, feel guilty about any of this. She does not think she will.

His fingers finish up with her hair – it seems as if he’s tied it back with the discarded elastic – and his mouth brushes over the bite on her shoulder. “My apologies. I got a bit carried away. Your magic, I assume, can heal it? We wouldn’t want anyone questioning what came to mar your lovely skin.”

She nods, transfixed by his voice and finally,  _ finally _ , feeling confident enough to glance up at him. His hair is a mess and his eyes look sleepy, sated, and the smile curving his mouth is, for some reason, impossible to read. She cannot tell if he is pleased, sad, or bored with her, now that their passion is spent. “You -- you enjoyed that, too?”

“Oh, Luna.” He rubs a thumb over her lower lip, and she wonders when he put his glove back on, because she thought she’d thrown it farther than he could reach with her still sitting in his lap. “I enjoyed that more than I can properly express. I do hope the experience was equally satisfactory.”

She reaches out, carefully, and puts her hand on his chest. Beneath her palm, she feels the steady thrum of his heart. Well. That’s good to know, but what a strange thing to imagine in the heat of passion, that your partner does not have a heart. “Yes, it was. Very.” She is still uncertain of his mood. “You are quite the adept teacher, Chancellor.”

His fleeting smile, more of a smirk than anything. He tips her face up with his fingers. “It’s Ardyn. For a little while longer, yet.” He kisses her before she can say anything, and she kisses back, stroking a hand over his hair. For as wild and messy as it appears, her fingers card easily through the strands.

She’s not surprised when he gently moves her off his lap -- she, too, can feel the moment between them come to its natural end.  _ I did get what I came here for. Several times. _

She stands, feeling the damp earth beneath her feet, and inhales deeply. She feels tired but  _ good _ , as if she finally understands something that until now has been kept from her. Luna discreetly uses her powers to heal the bite on her shoulder, though part of her almost wants to leave it. She cannot imagine what would happen if Ravus saw it, though. The thought makes her clasp her hands to her cheeks and stifle a wild, completely inappropriate laugh.

Ardyn walks over to her, and she notices his hat on the ground near her feet. He goes to his knees, but instead of retrieving it as she expects, his hands settle once more on her hips and  he pulls her forward, pushing her tank top up enough to expose only her lower stomach.

Before she can ask him what he intends, he presses his mouth to her side and inhales sharply. She can feel the heat of his breath on her skin, though the fingers curled around her ribs are still cold as death.

Of all the things he’s done to her body in the last however long they’ve dallied here, this is by  _ far _  the most unsettling.

“Tell me, Oracle,” he says, and his voice is muffled but there is a reverence in it she finds disturbing. “Will you give me your blessing?”

“You bid me keep my powers to myself,” she reminds him, fingers curling into her palms. She does not, in this moment, want to touch him. Even her magic seems repelled.

Ardyn presses another kiss to her stomach, more like a benediction than the caress of a lover. When he finally looks up at her, his eyes look sad, his expression lost. “You misunderstand me. I ask not to be healed, but for the blessing that only you, as Oracle, can bestow to a supplicant.”

_ Being on your knees does not make you a supplicant,  _ she thinks, and he smirks like perhaps he heard.

Luna has certainly been asked for her blessing before. And it is not her place to withhold it, for all who walk Eos do so by the grace of the gods and that would, she assumes, include him. Luna places her hand on his head, but when she goes to speak the words --  _ blessed star of light and life _  -- they will not come.

His smile is slow and full of wrath. “As I thought.” He collects his hat and rises to his feet. “Alas, it seems the time has come to leave Ardyn and Luna in the garden.” He pulls her in close, but his kiss falls not on her mouth, but her forehead. “Do recall your promise, hmm? Think of me and the time we spent together fondly, when you find yourself in need of pleasure.”

“Yes,” she says, feeling oddly near tears at his strange solemnity, so at odds with his earlier behavior. “I will. Good evening, Ardyn.” The blessing she so badly wants to give him will not come, all tangled up like wire.

He settles his hat on his head, then tips it to her. “Until we meet again, then.”

She watches him walk toward the house, the shadows pulling at him like an undertow.

***

It isn’t until she’s standing in her bathroom that she notices her hair.

It’s plaited in some elaborate braid, tied up and twisted and expertly fastened in a way that defies all reason and logic. She cannot imagine how he did this so quickly and with such expertise. And with only one hair tie.

It is an old style, not one worn often by women of this day and age. Luna has seen it before, though. In the history books, in images of her ancestors, robed and holding their trident high, ready to meet the summons of the gods they served.

Tucked behind her ear, as if it had been there all along, is a sylleblossom. As she watches, the petals fall like rain until the stem is bare, blooms scattered like teardrops at her feet.  


End file.
